Success of a fast food restaurant depends on how fast a customer can be served with fresh food. Ideally, if the rate at which a restaurant cooks a food product and the rate at which the food product is sold are equal, the restaurant will have fresh food on hand and ready to serve. In other words, for the ideal fast food restaurant operation, the operator must know how many food products will be sold in the future. Although historical sales data for a food product can be used to predict future rates of sale, the prediction is highly approximate and subject to numerous unpredictable events and variables that the historical data do not reflect. As a result, a restaurant operator must precook a certain number of food products and have the cooked products on hand for immediate service.
Precooked food products cannot be stored for prolonged periods and must be heated during storage to assure freshness. The period before the food product is no longer considered fresh or is spoiled varies with each food product. Therefore, it would be beneficial to have a food storage system for storing and heating various precooked food products at storage temperatures and for periods suitable for each type of food products.